Wednesday, July 12, 2017

Inside Story: Can Tillerson Get Anti-Qatar Quartet to End GCC Crisis?


It's the worst dispute to hit this region since the founding of the Gulf Cooperation Council in 1981. Now, a little more than a month into a blockade of Qatar imposed by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt; the U.S. is taking an active diplomatic approach. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is visiting Saudi Arabia - after having made stops in Doha and Kuwait city over the last few days. He praised Qatar after it became the first regional power to sign a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. to fight terror financing. But can he change the positions of the blockading countries? | Presenter: Adrian Finighan | Guests: Ali Al Kandari - Professor of Contemporary Gulf History at Kuwait University; Fahad Al-Attiya - Qatar's Ambassador to Russia; David Hearst - Editor of the Middle East Eye.